We've long suspected that octopuses / octopodes / whatever are so damn creepy and unsettling, they've GOT to be aliens.
After all, they're capable of slipping through the tiniest of openings to escape, they're able to figure out a jam jar works and they're essentially the evil genius of the deep sea.
Dr. Clifton Ragsdale, a leading researcher at the University of Chicago, conducted the first genome sequence of the octopus and found some pretty interesting results. For one, it is completely different from all animals - or humans, for that matter.
"The octopus appears to be utterly different from all other animals, even other molluscs, with its eight prehensile arms, its large brain and its clever problem-solving abilities," explained Dr. Ragsdale. He went on, quoting zoologist Martin Wells who first postulated that the octopus must be alien. "In this sense, then, our paper describes the first sequenced genome from an alien."
Humans carry 25,000 protein-coding genes whereas the octopus has 33,000 - that's a total of 8,000 more coding genes than us. PAY ATTENTION IN THE BACK THERE, I'M NOT REPEATING THIS.
Anyway, the sequencing conducted at the University of Chicago also had a few other discoveries. For one, the researchers think they've cracked how the octopus is able to think so fast and how it registers taste through its suckers on its tentacles. Sorry if you were eating just there.
Moreover, the octopuses' ability for its tentacles to continue functioning - even after it's been dismembered - is being adopted and researched for use in robotics. So when the robot apocalypse eventually happens and we find out that dismembering them has little or no effect, we'll have the octopus to thank. Wonderful.
Look, it's all very exciting - but here's the takeaway. The octopus is an alien who is biding their time until they develop an evil formula to conquer the surface.
Be. WARNED.
